


Roses

by Kalaiscope



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Dead Characters, Death, Gen, M/M, Mild Gore, angst all around, i am so so sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-07
Updated: 2013-10-01
Packaged: 2017-12-25 20:58:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/957533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalaiscope/pseuds/Kalaiscope
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of very short drabbles centered around some needy, broken children.</p><p>1) <i>'Someone hands Jean a baby.'</i></p><p>2) <i>'However you look at it, it's wrong. This is not what was supposed to happen.'</i></p><p>3) <i>'You didn't even try to understand him, did you?'</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wait-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will probably be converted into something like a drabble collection, later. Once I have more than just this thing. 
> 
> Absolutely not a fill for [this](http://snkkink.dreamwidth.org/2124.html?thread=3080780#cmt3080780) prompt.

Someone hands Jean a baby.

With all the commotion around him, laughing groups of adults, new recruits standing around awkwardly trying to converse only among themselves, and kids running around between everyone's legs being a general nuisance, he can't even tell where the baby came from, nevermind who it belongs to or what he's supposed to do with it. Who's idea was it to have a big family party shindig with the whole of the (remaining) Recon Corps? He wants to find them and punch them in the gut, this is the most socially awkward and uncomfortable situation he's been in. Ever.

The baby gurgles. Jean panics. How does one hold a baby? Under the armpits? No, that doesn't seem right. And what if it does something gross like pee or spit up on him? Catching a glimpse of dark hair passing by, he turns frantically for help. "Marco! Marco, what do I-...?"

The stranger pauses, and gives him an odd look. Jean swallows thickly.

"Sorry. Mistook you for someone else. My mistake."

The baby starts to wail.


	2. Bad Ending

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The new title is a casual reference to both the roses on the Garrison uniform (irrelevant) and the ridiculously gay portrayal of the characters within this collection (although so far they are not actually all that blatantly gay).
> 
> Apologies to all the people I made cry with the first part. That was absolutely my plan. Mission accomplished.
> 
> (This is probably full or errors but it's 2 am and I can't write anything but angst leave me alone.)

"Trainee, do you know him?" 

The woman's eyes are bright and bloodshot over the handkerchief covering her mouth. They are eyes that have seen more death in the past few days than most people have seen in their whole lives. Windows into a mind forced into numbness, not out if apathy, but out of necessity. 

"It's been three days since the breech was plugged, but we're still collecting the bodies. At this rate, we run the risk of a widespread epidemic."

He's not listening his entire being balks at the idea that this, this corpse, this swollen, stinking, decaying body, is all that remains of his best friend. "I knew I hadn't seen him around, but this... This is too much..." 

The continually falling ash stings his eyes. Maybe he's imagining it. Maybe it's a mistake. But no, even twisted and ripped apart, he would know this figure anywhere. 

"Trainee, I need to know; what was his name?"

The words (how can she sound so cold?) register too quickly. It hurts.

"104th Training squad..." He chokes out, still unable to look away. "7th in our class... Jean Kirschstein."

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see her writing something down on a clipboard. She says something else, but he doesn't hear, only vaguely acknowledges the sound of her boots tapping against the cobblestones, fading. The world seems to be tilting. 

Wrong. This is wrong.

He kneels beside the body, feeling dampness through the knees of his breeches but not caring. "Jean," he whispered, cracked and broken. "Jean, what happened to you? Weren't you supposed to be our leader?" 

There's a wrenching feeling in his gut, and he struggles to breathe. This is so wrong. Jean can't be dead. Jean is not expendable like he is. It should be him lying there, it should be Marco with half his torso and face bitten off, mouth twisted into an ugly grimace. 

It's wrong, but there's nothing he can do about it. 

Two days later, Marco Bodt of the 104th Training squad vanishes. There is no time to organize a search. He is chalked up as another causality of the Trost battle, mourned, and honored. Eventually, just like every other dead soldier and civilian, he is forgotten.

This is not the way things were meant to happen.


	3. Gnossienne

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This originally started because I was flicking through random pages on the Dictionary of Obscure sorrows, but it ended up spiraling out of control and not really being relevant to the word I started with (which is the title for this 'chapter' if you are curious, because I am hopeless at naming things).
> 
> This one is a little gay. I have a deep love for unrequited Marco>Jean slash stupid oblivious Jean (until it is too late). It's probably even more full of errors.

It's funny, how easily you seem to have accepted Marco into your life. He's become a fixed feature in the collection of memories and thoughts and aspirations that you're starting to think of as 'home'. In a lot of ways, Marco IS your home. All your bits and pieces, which would be rattling around in drawers, he's taken out and arranged on display. If all those sensations and dreams are the furnishings of your home, then Marco is the house that holds them. He's always with you, it seems, and you like to keep him close. Being with him is comforting, bizarrely. You're so completely different, but he compliments you so well. He knows everything about you. How you work, how you think, how you feel. About your family and your hometown and all the little stories you've told him, in slivers and anecdotes, pieced carefully together to build an image of you that even you're not that familiar with. He knows you better than you know yourself.

But for all that, as you are slowly beginning to realize, Marco is a mystery to you. You know he's... Nice. He doesn't like confrontation or arguments. He doesn't like onions either, tries to pick them out of his soup every time they appear, but ultimately gives up and chugs it anyway. You don't know why he doesn't like them. Maybe it's the flavor, or the texture. Maybe he had a bad experience with onions. And you can ask, but it's such a silly thing, and it always slips your mind almost as soon as you've thought it.

The truth is, Marco knows everything about you, and you've never bothered to learn about him. You don't know what his family is like. You don't know if he even HAS family. You don't know if he has any strong likes or dislikes aside from onions and antagonism. You don't know why he decided he wanted to serve the king, how the fall of wall Maria affected him, or if he had friends before he met you. All you know is that he's good at listening. He can calm you down faster than anyone else can. And that he is, most likely, an angel. 

At least he might have been. You're a little late in realizing this. It must be what they say, you know, the proverb about how 'you never know what you've got until its gone'. You should be using past tense, as you watch the pyre stacked with mostly unidentified bodies sizzle and char.

But, you reassure yourself, there is one thing you do know. Marco is- was- a terrible liar. His honesty was his biggest fault, and deception was beyond his capabilities. If there was one thing he tried to hide, he ended up broadcasting it clearly, so that even you picked it up. Obviously, wholeheartedly, and with the kind of benign innocence unique to him.

Marco loved you.


End file.
